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Blood Pressure and Diabetes

Blood Pressure is another one of the key health metrics you need to keep track of to make sure you don’t suffer some of the complications of diabetes. High blood pressure is a lot like diabetes in some respects, you can have it for years and not know it, and the entire time it damages your heart, blood vessels, kidneys and other parts of your body.

The term Blood Pressure is an actual measurement of the force of blood pushing against the walls of the arteries as the heart pumps blood.

Blood pressure doesn’t stay the same all the time. It lowers when you sleep and rises when you wake up. Blood pressure also rises when you’re excited, nervous, angry or scared. It also rises when you are physically active – which is good, unless it goes too high.

High Blood Pressure (HBP) is a condition that exists when your numbers stay above normal most of the time; “normal” is considered to be 120/80 and will be explained later in this article. HBP is a serious condition that can lead to heart disease, heart attack or failure, stroke, kidney failure and other health problems. Diabetes puts people at much greater risk for all of those conditions, so it is extremely important to keep your blood pressure levels in a healthy range.

About 1 in 3 adults in the United States has High Blood Pressure. The condition usually has no symptoms, so knowing your blood pressure numbers is important, even when you’re feeling fine. If your pressure is normal, you can work to keep it that way. If your pressure is too high, treatment may help prevent damage to your body’s organs.